


The Heroic Quest for the Lost Fanfiction of Darling Charming

by ruff_ethereal



Category: Ever After High
Genre: F/F, Out of Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-13
Updated: 2015-02-13
Packaged: 2018-03-12 06:40:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3347324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruff_ethereal/pseuds/ruff_ethereal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darling Charming entrusts her latest fanfiction doorstopper to Raven Queen with the intent of it being lost forever after.</p>
<p>Instead, it comes back to her completely intact, and Raven wants her to publish them on the mirrornet.</p>
<p>After some prodding and a lot of buttering and some compromise, Darling goes off on a heroic quest for her lost fanfiction--and the heart of a Queen, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Heroic Quest for the Lost Fanfiction of Darling Charming

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).
  * Inspired by [A True Heart's Beat](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3310826) by [thelinksthatconnectus (orphan_account)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/thelinksthatconnectus). 



> This was written before any canonical portrayal of Darling Charming.

As a future damsel-in-distress (before becoming a Rebel, at least), items Darling Charming entrusted to friends and complete strangers with heartfelt pleas to keep them safe always ensured they would be lost almost immediately.

Retrieving them would involve a lengthy and dangerous Heroic Quest fraught with peril, one that would challenge the intrepid adventurer at every turn, teach them more about themselves and help them grow as people, and finally, upon return of the item, earn them the eternal gratitude and maybe even the love of the owner.

It was something most everyone ignored in favour of the simpler tasks of comforting Darling, telling her that material things were fleeting and the loss was no big deal, or just offering to buy a replacement.

It was an extremely simple and convenient way to get rid of things that Darling needed to disappear forever after, and she was grateful for it. (Items that did turn up were easily passed off as the ultimate goal all along, and thus, were cherished by the finder and never seen again anyway. Win-win.)

Of course, she should have realized her folly in letting Raven Queen borrow the latest item she wanted gone. Though she had to admit, the item in question being her latest fanfiction doorstopper was an appropriately Heroic Blunder.

Instead of it disappearing, Raven Queen returned with the thick sheaf of loosely bound, plain parchment, and wanted to do the exact opposite to it.

“You should really publish these on the MirrorNet!” Raven said.

“No.” Darling replied.

It was not an Authoritative “No!” to be shouted at a Foul Villain whispering lies, slander, and other really mean things into one’s ear, the prelude to a Speech of Heroic Resolve. (Or Slaying the Villain, whichever time and the mood allowed.)

It was not a quiet, whispered “No…” to be said while cradling your unconscious and/or dying prince/rescuer’s head in your lap, tears welling up in your eyes, with the ideal one drop running down your cheek and onto their face.

It was not an anguished, prolonged scream of “No…!” properly done with your face and arms raised to the heavens, extra credit for tears pouring down your cheeks—triply so for doing it in bad weather like rain, snow, or hail. (But not too strong of a storm—that would just be plain dangerous, and more importantly, no one would be able to see or hear you.)

It was a curt, firm “No.” that meant the end of the discussion.

Sadly, Raven was a known rule-breaker and she wasn’t about to stop now.

“Well, why not?” Raven asked, more curious than angry.

Darling sighed. “Who’d want to read it?”

“I just did.” Raven replied.

“There’s already the official book…”

“But this one is so different from it!” Raven cried, holding up the sheaf of papers for both to see. “It’s a completely different story from the original! Like how Hemlock just decides to change for the better. She’s still done all of those horrible things, but she owes up to them, and wants to help the protagonists now.”

“I always liked Hemlock as a character;” Darling said. “Her wit is unmatched, and she’s far more interesting than Wolfsbane.”

“Hex yeah! Speaking of Wolf, he’s _so_ much better as the antagonist! I love how he tries to contain the Root of Despair himself even though Hemlock could do it for him—and how he just up and ignores everyone, even Aloe. _Major_ fairy fail!”

Darling snorted. “The man charged into everything thinking he’s the only one that could do it. About time it came back to bite him in the bookend.”

“Mhmm!” Raven nodded in agreement. “And Aloe’s reaction! Agh, I couldn’t even see the page let alone turn it, I was crying so hard!”

Darling smiled. “Yeah, I was pretty happy with how that scene turned out.”

“Thanks for making her get over it all by herself, by the way. It’s really nice to see she can get herself out of her own fairy funk without anyone’s help. Having her meet everyone outside of her room, just before they were going to knock on it was hilarious and pretty awesome.”

Darling grinned. “Aloe’s a strong girl, we all know that; Wolf just needed to stop stealing the spotlight so she could _really_ shine.”

“She's so much better as the protagonist, too! She doesn’t need to find a magical walking stick and have an ancient prophecy tell her she’s the chosen one. She just picks up her bow, and goes off to fight the Nightshade and Wolf—former friend or no.”

“Aloe doesn’t strike me as the type to wait for the scribes to come and make sure they get her good side the entire time.” Darling said with a half-amused, half-sad chuckle.

Raven smiled and nodded. “And Hemlock’s _much_ better as the deuteroganist and love interest to Aloe. It just feels more natural and less forced, you know? Aloe isn’t there to be the damsel for the daring adventurer to rescue and marry at the end of the quest, they’re just together because they _want_ to be together.”

Darling smiled back. “They deserve to be happy, how they want to be happy—not how others are telling them to.”

Raven chuckled. “Kind of like us Rebels, huh?”

Darling laughed. “Hey, write what you know, right?”

Raven nodded. “In fact, there were parts there where I related _so_ much to Hemlock that you could have switched it out with ‘Raven’ and everything would be _exactly_ the same.” She said with a knowing smile.

Darling blushed. “It’s a work of fiction—any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.”

Raven hummed. “I see. Because if it weren’t a coincidence and an _enchantingly_ good love letter, I’d have told them I felt the same way. That is, if it were me and you that Aloe and Hemlock were supposed to represent. Which obviously, they’re not; it’s just a coincidence.”

Darling forced her smile to stay where it was. “Yeah, coincidence.” She said in a markedly less confident voice than usual.

She silently cursed herself, foregoing the more dramatic “wailing, falling to her knees, and sobbing into her hands” that her old Princessology teacher would have recommended.

“Anyway, it’s a really good story.” Raven said. “You really should put it up on the MirrorNet.”

“No.” Darling replied.

It was a weak, uncertain “No.” The kind you made when you didn’t want to say “Yes,” but you leaned too far to one side for “Maybe.”

“Well, what’s the problem now?” Raven asked.

Darling sucked in a breath. “That’s the only copy in existence—longhand in plain ink on plain scroll.”

“I know a hexcellent transcription spell.” Raven said. “Failing that, Maddie’s a wicked fast typist and speed reader.”

Darling paused. “Do you really think anyone else will want to read it?”

“No. But I know I really want to read more of your stories—if there’s more of them, I mean.”

Darling brightened up. “Oh, hex yeah, I’ve written lots of them!”

Raven brightened up, too. “Really? Where are they?”

“I—“ Realization hit like the Big Bad Wolf blowing her house down. “Lost them. Every single one of them, except that one.”

Raven’s face fell. “Oh.”

“But! You know how lost is never truly lost!” Darling smiled. “I’m sure those stories are out there somewhere. Just need to go find them.”

Raven blinked. “You’d do that for me?”

Darling chuckled. “Hey, stories exist to be read, right?”

Raven smiled. She stepped forward and planted a kiss on Darling’s cheek. “For good luck on your search. Kisses from fair maidens do that, right?”

Darling blushed bright red and nodded.

Raven casually waved goodbye. “I’ll leave you to your heroic quest to find the lost fanfiction of Darling Charming.” She turned around and left Darling’s room.

Darling watched her go until the door shut behind her. Once alone, she immediately dug into her back drawers and pulled out the “To Be Lost and Never to Be Found” journal she’d kept in the unlikely situation she’d ever actually want any of the items back.

She wasn’t mad, even if this whole Heroic Quest was a result of her own folly. Heroic Blunders always did make a story more exciting—and sometimes, a setback is what you needed to get farther along.

* * *

Darling patted the alligator on the head with one hand, and shook her soggy sheaf of lost-now-found fanfiction with the other. The reptile rumbled in thanks, the story having been a nuisance to its digestive system for since who-knows-whence-upon-a-time.

The Rebel knight bid it farewell and they went their separate ways, the alligator back to the swamp, she to a sunny, mostly dry rock. The story was laid out to dry, and Darling examined it: the ink was faded, the edges had curled up, and there was an awful stench to it, but the whole thing was legible and complete. (And if it was missing a few pages, Darling was sure they would turn up eventually, or she’d just rewrite it. Perks of being the original author.)

She opened her enchanted sack of holding and smiled at the sheer number of her writing she’d lost then found. She chuckled as she remembered a similar adventure, not too long ago.

She was helping Dexter out in Hero Training, as usual. They were holding a practical exam, drilling the students in finding lost tomes, hidden scrolls, and missing pages.

Dexter had failed to order the troll to surrender the tome, got vertigo when he tried to retrieve the page from a bird’s nest on a sheer cliff face, and couldn’t even reach the scroll way up on the high shelf.

Though, to his credit, he was a great distraction so Darling could steal the tome from under the troll’s nose, he held the rope as steady as she needed him too, and his shoulders made a great perch to stand on. (He was a fantastic fall-breaker, too.)

Thinking back on it, they’d never really read the contents or even looked at the titles except to confirm that they were the right ones. They were being timed—the faster the better—and Dexter’s grades needed all the extra credit they could get.

(Darling’s own grades in Damsel-in-Distressing were fixed with an extra-credit rescue from the Tower of Gloom and Doom by Dexter’s hand. Or, at least, the records said so.)

Darling checked her mirrorphone. She’d gotten most of her retrievals done in record time, though, ever prepared, she’d purposefully overestimated how long it would take her to find her lost fanfiction to make allowance for any Dramatic Twists, Unexpected Developments, or good old Unseen Antagonists.

Some of her contacts hadn’t followed up on her with any leads or clues about the writing she’d yet to find. Her return to Ever After High was for another hour yet. The Rebel knight cast a glance at the sunning manuscript and found it agreeably dry.

It was still smelly, but then again, Darling wasn’t much better, having been slogging it through Dank Basements, Creaky Attics, Dark Forests, Fetid Swamps, Ominous Dungeons, and Cluttered, Disorganized Storage Rooms all day.

She picked it up and read the cover:

On the Merits of Humane Substitutes to Animal Alchemical Ingredients

By Darling Charming

Darling laughed. One of her first works of fanfiction! She remembered this one; she’d just gotten into the _Bloom_ fandom and was wondering what all the hub-hub was about with Aloe and Hemlock being a couple, though they were most assuredly enemies in the actual book.

(Embarrassingly, she’d reread the whole thing before realizing they were actually talking about fanfiction.)

She’d devoured most every single story about the unlikely couple soon after, and after having found herself wanting for more, did what any Charming would do: she made more of it herself.

This was one of her fourth or fifth attempts—complete ones, that is. Writing was absurdly hard, almost like swordsmanship; there was a flow and a skill to it that could only be gained through years of hard, determined, and constant training with few interruptions if you wished to master it.

The pen may not have been mightier than the sword in Darling’s book, but it certainly was a worthy opponent and an awe-inspiring tool.

She flipped open the page and found the opening line just as clever and enticing as it was when she first wrote it who-knows-whence-upon-a-time.

Unfortunately, that was about the _only_ thing that was as good as she remembered it.

Dialog she’d found clever and witty suddenly seemed tacky and at worst, left-field and inorganic, like the author had just thrown them in the hopes that the reader would find them so regardless of the context.

Action she’d found smooth and fast paced now seemed jumbled and stuttered, awkward stops all over the place. Some parts she felt dwelt too much on the minutiae of Hemlock’s alchemy; all that research into the process now seemed so unnecessary.

Worst of all, the ending didn’t have its punch anymore; it was now more like a feeble tap and vigorous winking, a hopeful smile on the story’s face, a silent wish that you’d enjoy it out of pity.

Darling put the story down. She cast a glance at her sack, filled with so many of her other stories.

Were they still as good as she remembered them? If she pulled them out now at random, would she see how good of a writer she was or proof that she should really just stick to the heroing business? What if there was a long-forgotten piece in there that she’d have trouble believing she’d written, it was that bad…?

She was pulled out of her thoughts by her mirrorphone beeping. She had a new text.

Of course, it was from Raven Queen.

“How’s the search going?” Raven’s message read.

“Great progress.” Darling replied. “Got almost all of them. Just waiting on leads for the last third or so. Hoping they’ll be somewhere exciting.”

“Spelltacular! Can’t wait to read them.”

Darling frowned. Would Raven still think that _after_ she’d read them?

No time to brood. She’d gotten a new message from a different number, one that made her smile.

“Dragon’s got the last ones.” Darling texted back to Raven. “Should be fun. Coming back to dorm room to get jewels, armour.”

“I’ll be waiting with another good luck kiss, then!”

Darling grinned and blushed. “Can’t wait.”

She rocketed off the rock, reinvigorated by a fresh dose of Heroic Resolve. Never mind what she thought of her writing—Raven Queen wanted to read them.

* * *

Raven blinked. “Woah. Must have been a spell of a fight!”

The smoking, soot-and-ash covered Darling laughed. “Nah! The dragon just had a hag case of the Sniffles.” She held up the sack full of her fanfiction. “Luckily the stories were in a fireproof chest. Exactly the same as before I lost them.”

Raven smiled. “Oh, Darling, you are just the best!” She lunged forward and wrapped her arms around her in a hug.

The moment was quickly ruined by all of the grime on Darling’s armour turning into a thick cloud of smoke hanging over the both of them.

Hacking and coughing up a storm, they stepped away and started waving it away. When the dust finally settled, both women were positively filthy.

Raven smiled sheepishly. “Heh… sorry.”

Darling shrugged and smiled back. “Hey, it’s not like I didn’t just go hiking up a mountain and back, right? Besides, watch:” She started patting her clothes, grime falling off of her and straight to the floor. To her delight, she ended up looking Rough and Rugged than Pristine and Proper.

Raven hummed in approval. “Nice!” She tried the same trick and somehow ended up filthier and grimier than before.

Darling resisted the urge to laugh or snigger. She succeeded, mostly.

Raven chuckled. “Guess I should follow up on that Thank You Kiss later when I get cleaned up…” She mumbled.

Darling blushed. “Actually, I’d love it if you’d bump it up to a ‘Thank You’ Date.” She said in a voice that sounded much less confident and Heroic than it usually was.

Raven grinned. “Well, I think that can be arranged. What’d you have in mind?”

“Oh, you know, maybe spend the evening at my dorm room, have some tea and crumpets, snuggle up on my bed and read all of this fanfiction I just went on a Heroic Quest to retrieve…”

Raven nodded. “How’s tonight sound, sometime around seven, reading till we both fall asleep?”

Darling slowly nodded back. “That sounds hexcellent.”

Raven kissed Darling on the cheek again. She left a soot-mark. “See you at seven!” She waved goodbye and turned around to leave.

Darling blinked. She noticed she still had the sack of fanfiction in her hand. “Wait, you forgot the stories!” She held it up for her to see.

Raven chuckled. “I want to save them for later.”

Darling lowered it. “Right. Gotcha.”

The door closed behind Raven Queen once more. Darling snapped out of her stupor; there was preparations to be done in time for tonight.

* * *

Ever the hero and devoted older brother, Daring had gotten her several new Mother Goose pillows just for the occasion, along with a new Fairy Godmother gown perfect for a “Slumber Date” as he’d called it. Dexter just wished her a great night with Raven.

Darling thanked them both from the bottom of her heart—Dexter just a tad more.

Raven’s friends were no less enthusiastic. Maddie had sent along several teapots of tea for every mood and occasion that the stories might have; Ginger had provided a number of tasty treats to snack on; and Cerise a picnic basket that could hold all of it, with their own little compartments for convenience’s sake.

The weather was getting in on the generosity, too: the night was chilly but not cold, enough to encourage snuggling up for warmth than closing the windows and wrapping blankets around them both.

It was shaping up to be an enchanting evening, if it weren’t for the fact that they would be spending them reading Darling’s fanfiction. Maybe they wouldn’t be so bad when she read them with Raven.

They still were. Worse, even. But they were a pittance compared to the joy she felt as Raven laughed, cried, fumed, gasped, and cheered while they read.

And Raven snuggling up to her chest before falling asleep? A much better ending than anything Darling could have ever written.

 


End file.
